by daniel-p 52 Replies latest jw friends
Welcome to the board, I assure you, nobody is going to laugh....we have all been through this and we are a unique, international community sharing a common bond of having survived the watchtower society. You will find tons of support here!
Welcome aboard and post lots!!
daniel-p, I understand what you are going through. First thing you have to know is you are, by far, not the only Witness rolling along and going through the motions of what is expected of them. Most of the ones at the Hall are terrified their double-life will be discovered or their real feelings and thoughts will pop out.
Secondly, I have no teeth gnashing for you. I only have a story and one question:
Suppose a man approached you with these words, "I am God's prophet. An important one, too. I should be compared to John, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and Isaiah. I have come to explain to you the fulfillment of all the prophecies of the Bible." He starts handing you books he has written that detail the meaning of each element of every prophecy of God. Not only that he reveals to you, by means of these books, that things you didn't even think of as prophecies actually were prophecies, and he tells you what they mean, too!
Once you have read all the books, he says, "Oh. One more thing. You have to prove yourself approved by God. Here's the requirements for that." He hands you another stack of books, "Study up on those, you are going to be judged according to how well you meet those requirements!"
This man dies after about thirty years, then a small group of men comes to you with more writings. This small group says that the other man was confused, he wasn't a prophet by himself. Instead, there was a whole group of folks and together they make a true prophet. But only about 13-17 actually decide what it is God is trying to say. This group changes many of the meanings of the elements of the prophecies, and many fulfillments change after the due date comes and goes unfilfilled. This group tells you it is a shame you got your hopes up based on what they said, you were just a little overeager.
Over the next 90 years, this same group keeps coming back and revising what God said would happen, often after the fact. They extensively revise what is required to please God during this period of time, too, adding and subtracting as time rocks on, sometimes even adding to and then coming back to remove the addition.
Would you teach your son that this group speaks for God? (Deuteronomy 18:20-22)
AuldSoul
Welcome ((( Daniel )))
There are many who have gone before you. Many of them on this and other JW Discussion Boards. Yes, you've made a big first step actually "speaking" (writing) about what you're doing through. Your confusion, guilt, fear, etc., are normal.
I'm the daughter of an Elder(tm) and was raised in the Truth(tm). Pulled out of HS in 1973 to go into the ministry before Armageddon came in 1975. I didn't leave because that prophesy didn't come true. I left because I married into the wrong JW family according to his congregation's elders, and I was shunned by people I had known most of my life; so called friends of my parents! I just couldn't take the double standard anymore, along with other hypocrasies I saw and experienced. I tried other congregations in the town I moved to, but my eyes were open and I now saw the B.S. everywhere! I no longer believed it was Jehovah's organization if one small city's congregations were that apparently corrupt, and left.
A few years back I told my dad that when required of me I would gladly stand before Jehovah, Jesus, and the 144,000 for everything I have done, good and bad. You see, I don't believe only JW.s have 'it'. (Actually, I don't think they ever did)
Like someone else said, "you're right where you are supposed to be". AND you can put away the rubber whipping hose!
-Brenda
daniel said, "I want to know the ever-elusive Truth. I want to know, for sure, if I am doing the right thing. If this isn't the truth, I am being taken for a hell of a ride."
May I be so bold as to say that you can't rely on ANYONE else to give you the Truth. All you will get from others is a mishmash of prefabricated beliefs that are most often blindly accepted as true and handed down to you. Truth lies within you, but it is not a "thing" which can be examined by the mind. It is that which lies beyond the mind, beyond the reasoning capicity of thought. If you are accepting as true anything which is presented to you by others, you are indeed being taken for a ride - a ride into delusion. This goes for ANY religion or philosophy.
Instead of looking outside yourself, look within. Look for that which is always here, for that which never changes - that is truth. When it is seen within it will then be seen everywhere. Then you will see that you are never separate from truth. This seeing is not based on ideas but on direct experience, not based on faith/belief but on the reality of your very Being.
I understand what poppers is going for, however a good first few steps might be considering the book of John, looking for truth and reading the context where the word is used. Then read Galatians. The whole book. Slowly and carefully. Then read 1 Corinthians chapter 2. Then read 1 John. The whole book. Carefully.
After that, you will understand why I say, I have no truth to give you. It isn't mine.
AuldSoul
Welcome daniel-p,
Breathe. You are not lost. Perhaps nobody is.
Paradoxical as it may sound, you do know a lot more than you know. Learning to hear and trust yourself (a big no-no in JW world) is a long way though.
Beware of WT-like questions, which are designed to beg for WT-like answers. Question the questions. Or, if you want to know what Christianity is about just read the NT as if you read it for the first time. I did just that when I was still in Bethel, 20 years ago. I had to unlearn a lot but it was worth it.
Take care friend.
AuldSoul,
I appreciate your words, but your suggestion, as heartfelt as it may be, quickly dismisses the possibility for looking directly within oneself in this very moment in favor of a bunch of words which are subject to all kinds of interpretation. As soon as you have words, ideas, and beliefs, you have the inevitable disputes that will arise as to their meaning. As soon as you have words, ideas, and beliefs, you have concretized the entity that would accept or reject them, thereby maintaining separation from others as well as from what has been called "god". Do you see how quickly we tend to demean ourselves? Are we so small and insignificant that we are unwilling to rely upon ourselves? Let go of everything and truth is revealed.
Hi Daniel-P -
I can't think of a single person who would laugh at you for your feelings about posting here. It might seem an extreme response to such a simple activity -- but the reprocussions can be extreme. And we all know that.
When I read your post, I was reminded of a thread dealing with that feeling of dread from when I first found JWD so I thought I would give you the link:
http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/7/78348/1.ashx
This is a great place to just get your thoughts out. People here really, truly understand what you are going thru and are always willing to share their thoughts and personal experiences with you. I don't think anyone except ex-jws can really understand what you are going thru.
Enjoy your stay here. It's really is a great place to breathe, learn, and grow.
-Aude Sapere (meaning: Dare to Know; Dare to Have Understanding/Wisdom)
Daniel Welcome
Your situation is no laughing matter. I think most of us have been through exactly what you are going through. I know I did.
Take your time and vent here.
Daniel the more I read your post the more I think you may be daeling with a possible anxiety disorder for the moment. Please don't take the phrase "anxiety disorded" as an offense. I dislike psychological terminology myself. "Anxiety disorder" really just means a hyped up stress response. I'm reading between the lines of what you write and it sound like your very stressed. Anxiety is VERY common among jw's and ex-jw's.
One of the things that tend to trigger this in us is too much thinking. Your so worried right now. I think it may be helpful to you to look into some relaxation programs, books, etc. Relaxation/anti-stress methods help a great deal with this.
You may want to consider putting all this thinking aside for the time being. Really it isn't going anywhere. You can always run yourself in circles with it at anytime. But the wrong time is when your already in a stressed state. My advice is to consider putting your worry on the shelf. Focus on relaxation methods and use them everyday without fail. Get the stress under control first (assuming i'm corect about this). Come back to all the thinking after this.
As far as all the thinking goes I think your taking too many burdens on at once. Your asking yourself too many questions that are difficult to answer. What happens is the following;
You ask yourself a question that your in conflict about. Because your in conflict you can't come to a satisfactory answer. This gives you stress from the lack of resolution. With no answer resolved you jump to the next internal conflict, start questioning the next dillema your worried about, and thereby bring your anxiety state up to level 2. Since the second worry can't be resolved right away you move on to the ment unresolved question, repeat the process, and bring yourself to stress level 3. In your mind you keep going around in circles pondering too many difficult questions. When you go through the whole list of these conficts/questions you return to the first on the list only to repeat the whole process again.
This is what i'm guessing is going on in your mind. You may think it's a lot of work to have to read some books on destressing methods and the like. Trust me it's worth your time and effort. Been there done that. You may want to research supplements that lower stress levels too. Different ones work for different people.
Try putting your questions to the side as much a possible. If there are any that you have to deal with at the moment then deal with those few only. But running around in circles with too many questions you can't answer at once really can drive you over the edge. I've seen ex-jw's do this. We tend to think too much as it is.
I have a question. Are you dealing with depression at all right now?
